Nas Talks Stepping To Tupac & Death Row In Central Park [VIDEO]

On Friday, March 16th, Steve Stoute interviewed Nas at SXSW Music and Media conference at the Austin Convention Center. In one portion of the sit down, Nas talks about stepping to Tupac in NYC’s Central Park—after the 1996 MTV Video Music Awards—and their doomed plans to meet up again in Las Vegas to really settle their differences.

“What [Tupac] said to me was, ‘Me and you are brothers. Me and you are never supposed to go at it. But I heard you was dissing me on mixtapes’,” recounted Nas. “I’m like, ‘I heard you was dissing me on this new Makaveli album.’ You were there, you know how none of us could be sitting here, me and you right now because it was a very dangerous situation right there and greater heads prevailed. We both knew we were supposed to continue that conversation and probably just squash the whole thing. I was scheduled to meet him in Vegas; you and Jimmy Iovine called me at 4AM and told me he might not make it.”

Their have been a bunch of versions of the story Nas described, with Snoop Dogg saying that the Queens MC got punked, although he gives Nas credit for not letting his goons loose. However, the Outlawz say Pac and Nas basically squashed their beef, which stemmed from a line in “The Message” from It Was Written.

In the second video, Nas discusses his ghostwriting for Will Smith’s Big Willie Style album but it’s more about Nas and Stoute, the rapper’s former manager, discussing how at times they weren’t on the same page as far the former taking advantage of opportunities.